


Deserve

by Janekfan



Series: TMA prompt fics [9]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Abandonment, Appendicitis, Delirium, Fainting, Fever, Gen, Hospitals, Major Illness, Nausea, Pain, Prompt Fic, Strained Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-05
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:08:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27406324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Janekfan/pseuds/Janekfan
Summary: Prompt! season 2 or 3 Jon's got terrible stomach pains and ends up having to ask Tim for a lift to the hospital, but Tim cuts him off bc Tim is aaaangry that he's asking for a favour. And maybe he says some horrible stuff that discourages Jon from asking anyone else for help. But then oh dear a couple days later Tim finds him collapsed bc Jon had appendicitis and bc he couldn't get to the hospital it ruptureddddd.and a dialogue prompt: "why didnt you say something?" "i didnt think youd want me to."
Series: TMA prompt fics [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2082912
Comments: 30
Kudos: 226





	Deserve

**Author's Note:**

> Indulgent ^^'''
> 
> Sorry!!

“T’Tim?” Looking up from his phone screen, he scowled at the sight. Jon was hanging off the door to his office with a white knuckle grip, panting open mouthed and pale. Seemed he’d come down with whatever flu took Sasha and Martin out. They’d been home sick since before yesterday and abandoned him here alone with their boss, who for all he promised to change, to be honest with them, was still insufferable. “Tim--” 

“ _What_?” Jon flinched, ducking his chin to his chest and dropping one arm to wrap around his middle. 

“Sorry, I. I’m not f’feeling very well.” Rolling his eyes, Tim went back to scrolling with a scoff. 

“Probably the flu.” Stubbornly, Jon had yet to move. Tim wasn’t quite sure he was able to the way he’d begun shaking. 

“D’doesn’t. It doesn’t--” He cut him off, angry at being interrupted. Angry at Jon making himself Tim’s problem, like he didn’t already have enough of them.

“Have you eaten?” Trembling fingers slipped, tightened, clutching at the molding. 

“No, no. I’m. I think--” 

“Then eat something. Get some sleep. Do all the normal things people do to take care of themselves. You’re not a _child_ , Jon!” 

“I kn’ _know_. Think. I th’think I need… _ah_.” 

“Don’t go bothering Martin about this either. I’m serious, Jon.” He fixed him with a firm glare. “He needs to rest. Go home. Drink water. Eat food. Stop making yourself our mess.” Somehow, he made himself even smaller, hunched into himself and barely upright. 

“Y’you’re right. M’sorry.” 

“Yeah.” Tim hefted his bag from where he’d stowed it under his desk. “You always are, aren’t you?” He avoided glancing behind him where he was certain he’d find Jon’s eyes wide and sad and lined with shadow. 

“Mm.” 

“Right. I’m going home.”

“Night, Tim.” 

Jon waited until he could no longer hear footsteps before allowing himself to fall the rest of the way to the floor, tucking his knees up and curling into himself on his side. The cement was cool against his cheek and even though he was completely alone in the Institute, Jon bit into his bottom lip to keep the pained whimpers scraping his throat raw from becoming too loud. Despite what Tim said, this didn’t feel like the flu. There was no way to escape the agony twisting up his insides with a spaghetti fork. Earlier that morning he thought it was just a bad stomachache but it worsened so quickly he’d been bent over his desk for the past few hours working up the wherewithal to move. 

He didn’t want to go to hospital alone. 

But, Tim. He’d thought. 

Maybe. 

Hot tears slipped over the bridge of his nose when he closed his eyes against the white hot fire poker digging around in his side. Tim was right, of course. He couldn’t be trusted to take care of himself. Always making his problems their problems. A spasm of misery swept over him leaving nausea in its wake and he groped blindly for the nearby bin, hunching over it only to end up with the echo of his own ragged breath in his ears. 

“Nngh…” Fumbling in his pocket, Jon groped for his phone, intending to call 999 and bear the hospital on his own and finding, tragically, that he must have left it on his desk. “ _Damn…_ ” There was no way of getting to it now, the thought of moving in the slightest causing more stinging tears. What he’d give for Martin. He’d never have left him here, even though he didn’t deserve his help or his kindness Martin would offer it freely and Jon would take advantage and take from Martin and take and take and take until there was nothing left. His teeth clattered together as the fine sheen of sweat cooled in the chill air of the archives. It was freezing and he was hurting, folded up on the floor just inside his office and if he didn’t know he was completely alone already, he’d have thought someone was stabbing him over and over and over again but there was no one and he _writhed_ , a worm stranded on the pavement after the rain. If Tim found him tomorrow, would he care? Would he just shut the door and pretend Jon wasn’t there? 

Jon wouldn’t even blame him if he did. 

Vision blurring in and out of focus, Jon fixed it on the glare of the emergency lights flooding over the cement, breath shallow and fast in an attempt to spare himself more pain. Any relief was wishful thinking and Jon let lead-lined lashes flutter shut, exhausted, curling tighter, hugging harder, choking on the pathetic noises and certain he was about to go mad. 

Worse, and worse, and impossibly _worse_ , and Jon once more attempted to reach his desk, extending an arm as far as possible before the knife buried in the very core of him twisted any further. Incandescent, the pain seemed to peak, stealing the air from his lungs, the sight from his eyes, any sound from his ears other than the blood rushing like lava through his veins, louder in crescendo, deafening. 

And then nothing. 

Tim shouldered open the door, briefly surprised when it was still dark, and figured Jon had listened to some advice for once in his life and gone home to recover. Thumbing through his feed, Tim dropped his bag and leaned back in his chair to put his feet up on the desk. As he reclined he noticed Jon’s office door yawning open in his peripheral vision, turning to look and wondering why the light was off. Jon never left his door open when he left, too suspicious to risk any of them getting a look at whatever he did all day. Tilting back too far, Tim nearly flipped the chair at the sight of a patent leather wingtip attached to a slender socked ankle, scrambling back to his feet to stumble to his knees at Jon’s side. When he touched the sleeve of his button down it was soaked with sweat; he was burning up under his hands and curled up so tight Tim couldn’t see his face, shivering violently with harsh chills and before he did anything else, he dialed 999. 

They’d be here soon. 

Eight minutes if the news could be believed. 

And Jon would be fine. 

Is this what he’d been trying to tell him last night? That he needed help? 

“Jon, hey.” Even shifting aside the mess of curls escaping from their tie only revealed a flushed cheek and gently Tim began to pull him apart, trying to unwind his arms only for Jon’s bloodshot eyes to spring wide with a hoarse shout at the attempt. 

“S’stop, stop… _please_...” Gasping, breathless, and to Tim’s horror, Jon began to cry, whimpering when he tugged at him once more.

“Jon!” He flinched as though he’d been struck, slamming his eyes shut and trying to comply and gagging on the next sob to claw its way out of him. 

“Sorry...s’ssorry…” hiccupping between swallowing damp gulps of air. It stopped his whining, those awful noises he’d been making only because he was forcing back the tide because Tim yelled at him. He hadn’t meant to, he’d never seen him like this, face nearly grey with pain and streaked heavy with tears. “T’Tim, it, it _hur’s_.” Slurred apologies strung together on an awful garland of stifled groans and wretched mewling, teeth grit together so tight Tim thought he’d see them fracture. 

“They’re coming. Just, just hang on.” Awkward silence broken only by Jon’s keening shattered further when the paramedics flooded into the space, shifting Tim out of the way and asking questions he had no answers to. 

“How long has he been like this?”

“I don’t know.” 

“How long has he been ill?” 

“I don’t know. Last night he was, we’ve employees out with the flu, I thought...” trailing off Tim was embarrassed. Last night, he’d looked bad. Last night, he’d asked for help. 

“ _Ah!_ ” 

“Jon!” Insistent hands were prying his arms away, uncurling him and touching him and Jon didn’t like to be touched by people he didn’t know and he was crying-- ”Stop, you’re hurting him!” And Jon’s weeping was so full of pain that Tim felt it in his own chest, squeezing his heart, constricting his lungs, and he took up his hand as it flopped limp over the edge of the gurney he was curled on top of, small and trembling, drenched in sweat, narrow back heaving in his effort to breathe. “Easy, Jon. It’s alright.” They slipped out, these familiar, comforting words he’d not said to the man before him in what seemed like over a lifetime. 

“40.3.” Crammed in the back of the bus hurtling through congested London streets, paramedics shouted numbers, readings, _words_ Tim didn’t understand between them, one slipping an IV catheter into a dusky blue vein and the other strapping an oxygen mask over his face while Tim kept hold of him in a careful grip as they tried and failed to get Jon’s attention. 

“Hullo, sir, can you tell me your name?” 

“It’s, uh, it’s Jon. Sims.” Tim supplied when it became clear he was too feverish to do so himself. 40.3. 40.3. _40.3_. A neverending and continuous chant. 

“Mr. Sims? Jon? Can you tell me where you are?” Unintelligible mumbling and nonsensical syllables punctuated Jon’s eyes rolling back beneath salt damp lashes. 

“Wh’what’s wrong with him?” 

“Burst appendix, looks like.” 

“That’s bad.” Of course it was bad. Had he left him there before or after? A dozen hours lying on the floor, infection raging unchecked. It was a wonder he hadn’t just--

“It is. He’ll be in an operating theatre soon. You can wait for him if you’d like.” They lurched to a stop, Jon’s gurney rushed so quickly into the hospital it tore his hand away from Tim’s. 

If they’d known more about their relationship, he doubted the doctors would have let him see Jon so soon but as it was, Tim, hands fisted in his jacket pockets, ducked past the curtain concealing the little bay in ICU from the rest of the world. Even drugged to the gills or perhaps because of it, Jon dredged up a proud and wobbly smile for Tim when he recognized him. 

“Din’t call Martin.” And honestly, what was he supposed to say to that? Anger and irritation at Jon’s witless proclamation bubbled up, near blinding. 

“No. You didn’t. Should have.” His boss looked so confused, upset, his expression twisting up and tears glossing his eyes. 

“But.” Did he remember being in the back of the ambulance, Tim holding his hand, insensate, _dying_? “You said.”

“I know what I said!” A machine attached to Jon somewhere via a lead or line and hidden under an ugly hospital gown beeped a warning, for what he couldn’t know. 

“Oh.” Moisture spilled over when he blinked, streaming down each cheek and getting lost somewhere in the wild tangle his nurses hadn’t had time to tame. “I. I’m sorry. I thought--”

“You didn’t.” It was cruel and mean and this was just stupid, fighting with Jon while he was barely out of majory surgery and clinging to the last instructions Tim gave him, proud that he’d followed them and looking for approval, raw emotions naked on his face. Why Jon would look to him for anything now. Hadn’t he learned? There was no going back to what they had before. There was no going back at all. 

In the end, Tim called Martin. And when Jon woke next it would be to someone glad to see him, happy to fret over him. If nothing else, Tim could give him that. 

“Why didn’t you say something?” Jon jumped at his desk, pressing a hand over his healing incision with a gasp. Martin had been by, if the pair of pills and still steaming cuppa were any indication. He’d likely be by again soon to make certain Jon took the antibiotics. He didn’t look well but he was being looked after. 

“I did.” Rather than the irritation as was his wont, Jon merely sounded tired, resigned. “And then--”

“You should have tried harder!” And Jon matched his bitten off volume, neither one wishing to attract Martin’s attention.

“You made it pretty clear you didn’t want to know!” His palm was still laid over his stomach. Tim knew he’d refused the good painkillers so he could work after spending over a week doing little else besides sleeping in between Martin’s check ups. But the spark was back in his eyes, however drawn his features, and he looked prepared for a verbal sparring match. Deeper though, hidden under all pretense and mask, Tim recognized the hurt, the abandonment there in the cant of his mouth, the set of his shoulders. “Trust me, you needn’t worry about me asking again.” And just like that the spark was gone, replaced by the exhaustion ground into him by this place, and he pinched the bridge of his nose, swiped his eyes quick enough he probably thought Tim hadn’t noticed. 

“Yeah, well. Next time tell Martin before it gets that bad. Or better yet, go to A&E--”

“Yes, yes, yes, so you don’t have to deal with me.” Jon turned away and back to his statements, a clear dismissal that Tim ignored, choosing instead to linger in the doorway and watch him pretend to read over the research notes. “Lesson learned.” 

“Always did take you longer than most.” The barest hint of a smile crossed Jon’s face, tainted with melancholy, and Tim pretended not to hear him as he left. 

“Thank you, Tim.”


End file.
